Online Jewellery Business:

In this post I am going to be looking at the create.net platform and seeing if it is any good for an ecommerce website.

I was introduced to the create.net platform via a Facebook group I am part of and a few people recommended it, so I had to check it out for myself. Create.net is based here in the UK and offers a platform to create ecommerce websites for small UK businesses, the platform can also be used for business websites as well.

For my Create.net Review, I have split it into two parts. The first part looks at the pricing, features and theme selection that Create offer and the second is how easy the platform is to use. That way I hope to give a good rounded picture of the platform.

Disclosure – this post contains affiliate links, which means that if you sign up to services via a link in this post, I do receive a small commission. BUT and I cannot stress this enough, in no way does this influence my review, if I don’t like something then I will say so!

Create Pricing

I think their pricing structure is really good, especially for the kind of business that they are targeting.

Personal

£9.99/m

Up to 50 ProductsUp to 10 PagesUnlimited BandwidthUp to £5k Annual Turnover4% Transaction Fee3gb StorageFree SSL CertificateUK Based Email Support

In 2020, Create overhauled their pricing structure and also the package names. This overhaul included the transition to a tiered pricing structure for all of their packages, meaning that when you hit certain sale volumes, you will automatically be upgraded to the next package.

This is designed to help you and your business grow as moving up to larger packages, not only gives you more resources but also more support options from the Create team.

The only thing that I do not like about the new changes is that they also charge a transaction fee on the two smallest packages, this is a feature I never like to see on ecommerce platforms!

For larger businesses, they do have a tailored package that is made to fit your businesses requirements and this starts from £79.99 a month.

Free Trial

To let you properly try out the platform, the create.net team give you a full 14 day free trial. On the free trial, you cannot take or process any orders but you can do pretty much everything else. If you want to start your free trial with Create.net, just click the button below.

Create.net Free 14 Day Trial

Customer Reviews

Before I get into my review, I thought I’d see what their customers think of the platform. I have searched Trustpilot, FaceBook and Google to find how they are rated:

4.9 out of 5

No Reviews

No Reviews

Create Features

The Create platform certainly isn’t short of features, especially when you consider the price point of the basic package. Every feature that you get with Create comes pre loaded on your store so there is no need to install or manage any apps.

Payment Gateways

The selection of payment gateways isn’t huge but it does include all the main players:

Create Payments (Credit and Debit Cards)

PayPal

Stripe

Sagepay

Worldpay

Barclaycard EPDQ

Nochex

The only gateway that would be a good addition is Klarna.

Do Create.net charge transaction fees?

Nope, they don’t charge any additional fees for using their platform. The only transaction fee you pay is your payment gateway fees.

Create Theme Selection

There is a really nice selection of 35 free, mobile responsive themes to choose from. The selection is very varied and the majority of industries and niches should be able to find something to suit them.

If you want to have a custom built theme, you can contact Create directly and they will quote you on how much it will cost. Alternatively, they do have what they call the Web Designer’s Kit. This allows developers or people who have knowledge of HTML and CSS to create their own template.

Create Support

Create have definitely put supporting their customers as a priority. I couldn’t find any any contact phone number but they do have live chat and email support.

You also get your own dedicated account manager, this is a really good feature as having the same point of contact every time you need to speak to them makes life much easier.

On top of this, they also have really good documentation and many also include videos that help explain things, sometimes this is better than reading through a document.

Create Web Hosting and Performance

I couldn’t find much information on the Create server or hosting environment, this is a little disappointing. Even though the majority of people won’t really look at this part, people who are looking to move to a new platform or have a history in ecommerce would like to know some of this.

That still doesn’t stop me from testing their sites platforms performance though! To do this, I have used my tried and test method of taking three of their customer example sites and running them through the Pingdom speed tool, once a day for three days, so that I get some good data. So how did they perform?

#1

Website: 0.72 Seconds

#2

Website: 0.73 Seconds

#3

Website: 1.01 Seconds

These are some really impressive times and the average load time of 0.82 seconds is the second best average load time that I have tested. The load times were also very consistent as well, which is something you really do want with your site.

How Easy is Create.net to Use?

Create.net is a aimed at people and businesses that have little to no experience when it comes to building a website. So how easy is it to use?

When I test a platform for ease of use, I look at 5 main areas:

Getting Started

Navigating the Dashboard

Customising your theme

Adding and Managing Products

Managing Orders

Getting Started

Signing up to the create.net platform is really easy to do, simply enter your email address and you will then be taken to a page where you are asked for some basic information such as your name and shop name. You will also need to create a username and password.

On the first login to your dashboard, you will be greeted with a pop-up that has a video embedded in it. I would definitely recommend watching this video as it gives you a really good introduction to the platform, I like this touch.

Clicking off the pop-up brings you to the set up guide and every step includes a video showing you how to do it. I think this is a great addition as it takes away a lot of the guesswork.

Navigating the Dashboard

The dashboard is very simple in terms of sections and this does make it easy to get around and you will know where most things are pretty quickly. I definitely think going to with the simplistic works well on this platform.

They have opted for a top navigation bar and this works really well with their system as your options for customising pages etc appear as a sidebar.

Customising Your Theme

I really like how you can customise your theme, it is one of the easiest systems to use and for me it is well balanced. It is simple enough for people to use who are new to building websites, but also offers enough options and flexibility for someone who is experienced in web design.

In the main design area, you can choose which theme you want to use, edit your header and footer layout, theme colours and theme fonts. It is really easy to do all this and you see the results of your changes instantly.

When it comes to changing the layouts of your pages, you can do it directly in the design area but for me, it is better to use content section. To create or edit a page layout, they use a block system and the selection of blocks is really good and many have different variations. You also have a lot of controls when it comes to how your images and text are displayed.

If you want to customise the layout of your shop, category or product page, then you do need to go into the general configuration settings of your shop section, you do have to use one of the pre-existing designs for this. This seems a little hidden to me, I would have preferred it to be more obvious as to where to find these options.

I would have liked to be able to add sidebars to my site. For me this is something that an ecommerce store should really have as it allows your visitors to narrow down their search.

Adding and Managing Products

Adding a new product on the create.net platform is a little different to many ecommerce platforms I have used. The main difference is that you add your product images at the end of the process to add a new product and there is no section within the menu to add an image any earlier.

Other than this little quirk, adding a new product is really simple, the tabbed layout isn’t over complicated and you aren’t confronted with too many options. It is pretty much the same story when it comes to creating a new category as well and makes organising your inventory easy to do.

In order to manage your inventory effectively, you need to switch from the standard to advanced view in the shop section as this is the only way you can view all your products on the same page. Aesthetically it isn’t the best looking but it works and that is all that matters.

In the advanced view, you can easily update stock quantity and pricing by clicking the small plus icon next to the product name. If you only have a small inventory, then the standard view works but the advanced view is better.

Managing Orders

I couldn’t do everything I wanted to when it came to testing out the order management and some things are blocked until your site is live, which is a little bit frustrating!

Fortunately, they do have some good documentation on this so I could read through the stuff I couldn’t test. Managing your orders is pretty easy and offer you a few different options. You can print picking list, dispatch notes (invoices) and labels in bulk or individually.

You can also update order statuses in bulk and you can export all of your order information in CSV format, which is always a useful feature.

Conclusion

Create.net Review

Paul @ EcommerceGold

Pricing

Features

Theme Selection & Customisation

Support

Hosting & Performance

Ease of Use

Summary

Is Create.net the best UK Alternative to Wix?

Yes, I have to say that I was really impressed with the Create platform and is a great option for a small ecommerce website or boutique business, which is who Wix’s target market is, as it offers a good selection of ecommerce features as well as being very easy to use.

The platform also allows you to show off and promote your business by adding content in the form of pages and a blog. It fills a need in the industry and it is better than the likes of Squarespace who are aiming for a similar kind of audience.

*April 2020 Update* while the Create platform is still a really nice platform to use and offers lots of potential to build a website, the introduction of a transaction fee for the two lowest packages as part of their new pricing structure really is not an improvement in my opinion.